Definition: organic particles in soil or water, usually defined by size class, (eg: up to 2mm in soil, or 1mm at sea) which may include detritus, as well as living particles such as microbes or pollen
Definition: organic particles in soil or water, usually defined by size class, (eg: up to 2mm in soil, or 1mm at sea) which may include detritus, as well as living particles such as microbes or pollen
Definition: The marine benthic biome (benthic meaning 'bottom') encompasses the seafloor and includes such areas as shores, littoral or intertidal areas, marine coral reefs, and the deep seabed.
Definition: Sediment is an environmental substance comprised of any particulate matter that can be transported by fluid flow and which eventually is deposited as a layer of solid particles on the bedor bottom of a body of water or other liquid.
Definition: An aquatic biome that comprises systems of open-ocean and unprotected coastal habitats, characterized by exposure to wave action, tidal fluctuation, and ocean currents as well as systems that largely resemble these. Water in the marine biome is generally within the salinity range of seawater: 30 to 38 ppt.
Definition: Capable of creating a new organism by combining the genetic material of two gametes, which may come from two parent organisms or from a single organism, in the case of self-fertilizing hermaphrodites.
Definition: A structural quality inhering in a bearer by virtue of the bearer's being thicker or more closely packed together; pressed tightly together.
Definition: a symbiosis in which a bacterium provides chemically-derived energy and nutrients, often via the oxidation of hydrogen sulfide, to a heterotrophic organism.
